


A Personal History of Midwestern Running

by nieded



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Coming of Age, Community: paperlegends, M/M, Midwest, Running
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-13
Updated: 2012-11-13
Packaged: 2017-11-18 14:27:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/562056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nieded/pseuds/nieded
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Modern high school AU. <i>“Everyone knows you’re talented Arthur,” she interrupts, “but when a team has to choose between you and some other runner of equal ability, they’re going to look at what else you have to offer to the team and to the school. du Lac says you’ll be the men’s captain in the fall, and I think this experience will help you prepare.</i> -- in which Arthur coaches Merlin on how to run.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Personal History of Midwestern Running

**Author's Note:**

> x-posted on LJ for the 2010 Paperlegends Big Bang challenge.
> 
> Thanks to Phe for the beta and all the previous support and comments from readers. Bringing this to AO3 now that I have an account.

Arthur gets jostled by the other boys as they race to the drinking fountain. It’s a breezy afternoon in May on their very last run of his junior year, and they are eager to get out and into the freedom of summer. He’s not really paying attention to Coach du Lac—no—too wound up in the sunlight and the somewhat coy glances Morgan keeps casting in his direction by the fountain. Her looks are less about attraction and more about the promise of mischief later, a look that he has come to know and grow fond of during their long prepubescent summer days. And the promise speaks of the brief and unrelenting summer ahead, Arthur’s last summer before graduation, and all the things that come with it: the sweltering heat and the underage parties and college applications. And the running. Of course.   
  
The men’s team captain, Leon, graduates in a week and after he steps down, Arthur will become the new team captain. Arthur has wanted from the very first day of freshmen year to become the senior captain. He loves running, and his father loves running, and he needs running to get into college. So Arthur knows that this summer his evenings will be filled with friends and house parties and his days filled with hours put into his father’s shop to help make the bills and save a little for college. The mornings will be devoted to his running and all day, every hour, he will think about what he should eat and how many hours he should sleep, and what it will be like to cross the finish line in October as the state cross country champion.  
  
“All right, I expect you to continue running on your own this summer. That means you, freshmen. You don’t get a break,” du Lac says, tapping his clipboard. “Has every one signed up for the e-mail list so you guys can organize group runs?”  
  
There’s a murmur of consent and various hands reaching for the sign-up sheet. A swarm of hugs and high fives happen around Arthur, and he finds himself clapping hands with one of his best friends, Zach, before being gathered up into a huddle around Leon to bid him farewell from high school, cheering, “NUMBER ONE! NUMBER ONE! NUMBER ONE! NUMBER ONE!” over and over.  
  
When the crowd breaks, the captain emerges to find Arthur. He’s as tall as Arthur but broader and wraps his long hair back in a bandana that manages to be cool just on the left side of hippy. He wraps his arm around Arthur’s shoulder and hustles him close. “You’ve got tough shoes to fill, punk. Do you think you can handle it?”  
  
Arthur laughs, and in this moment he feels hot and solid but also so light he could float to the tops of the trees. “You’re just afraid I’ll outshine you, Leon,” he boasts, swaggering slightly under the captain’s arm.  
  
Leon laughs, bats him on the head. “Pendragon, you better learn the difference between fame and infamy. You’re still just the prince until I walk across the stage for my diploma. Capiche?”  
  
“Yeah, yeah,” Arthur snorts. “Capiche.”   
  
Behind them, Zach starts to yell, “CAPICHE YOU MOTHER FUCKERS. WE’RE THE X-DOUBLE-C MAFIAAAAA,” tearing off his shirt to wave above his head like in  the rodeo. “MAFIA! MAFIA! MAFIA!” He chants and lets loose the shirt into the air. The three of them watch it soar in slow motion, like an elegant kite rippling in the air, the force of gravity bringing it down to land on—  
  
“Oh shit!” Zach yells, grabbing Arthur by the arm before sprinting. “Run! Run!”    
  
Arthur stumbles, clutching to Zach’s calf as they both come to a crash with Morgan hot on their heels.  
  
“How dare you throw your nasty-ass shirt on my head!” she screeches, whipping them both with it.  
  
Arthur rolls onto his back and brings his arms protectively over his face. “I didn’t—don’t hit me! It was Zach! Zach’s shirt!”  
  
His pleas only cause her to whip harder. “Ugh! You juvenile jerk offs!”  
  
And in the damp spring mud and the hot summer air, this is how Arthur’s junior year comes to a close: Zach laughing riotously beside him taunting the women’s fastest runner into a game of tag across the parking lot.   
  
\----  
  
But Arthur’s almost-perfect summer has one foe. By the last day of school, students and teachers alike have mentally checked out. They spend the period handing back left-over assignments and clearing out lockers. A frustrated Arthur—half-ready to dump all of his belongings in the trash for the sake of not having to lug it home—gets stopped by Coach du Lac in the hall.  
  
“Pendragon, just the man I was looking for. Follow me please,” he says. Arthur dumps his pile of accumulated papers back into his locker with relief and follows the man down the hall.  
  
In addition to coaching cross country, du Lac teaches senior English and a course on The American Short Story. In an otherwise dying department, his classes thrive with fawning girls. It must be the hair, Arthur thinks as he inspects the artfully swept back style.  Morgan and her friends Ashley and Leah can sometimes be overheard admiring du Lac when he leads speedwork, moaning over his legs and his butt when he runs. Personally, Arthur doesn’t see it, sparing one rapid glance at du Lac before staring at his shoes. Definitely not.  
  
du Lac leads them down the stairs and into the main offices. Arthur has only ever stepped in here to use the PA for cross country announcements, and frowns when he gets lead towards the guidance counselor.   
  
“Um, Coach? Am I in trouble?”  
  
“Oh, not you, Pendragon,” du Lac responds, opening the door and ushering him inside.  
  
Ms. Smith greets them when they enter, sitting in a straight-backed but padded chair designed to make the students feel welcomed and reassured. She wears black, thick-rimmed glasses with tiny studs in the side and more casual clothes, her curly hair pulled back into a loose ponytail. For the most part, Arthur likes her if only because he has only ever interacted with her once or twice, and the team takes a general interest in her because of her relationship with Coach du Lac.  
  
Arthur sits himself in the only other chair in the room next to her and shifts hesitantly. du Lac checks his watch twice, and Ms. Smith frowns.  
  
“Well, the other student is running a little late,” she says in mild irritation, “but I think we can get started without him.” She folds her hands in her lap and smiles in Arthur’s direction. It’s not a friendly smile, Arthur decides, but maybe more a grimace. “Are you aware of a Merlin Emrys?”  
  
“Uh, yes,” he responds. “I know of him.”  
  
“Well, Mr. du Lac and I were discussing that maybe you could help him this summer. He’s behind in his classes and we think it’d be beneficial to him if he had help.”  
  
Arthur blanches. Merlin Emrys? The kid who failed phys ed and cuts chemistry twice a week? Arthur’s heard rumors of him but has never actually interacted with him. All he knows is Merlin Emrys is the hick stoner who lives in a hut in the woods, wearing ratty flannel and obscure, uncool band t-shirts—also that he drools during class and leaves it for Arthur to find on his desk whenever they switch classrooms.  
  
“Oh I don’t know,” he protests. “I’m going to be really busy this summer working in my dad’s shop, so…”  
  
“Mr. du Lac tells me you’re hoping to get a running scholarship to cover your tuition costs after graduation.”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“Well, I think this would be a good opportunity for you to build up your résumé for when you start applying next year,” Ms. Smith says.  
  
“Um, well—”  
  
“Everyone knows you’re talented Arthur,” she interrupts, “but when a team has to choose between you and some other runner of equal ability, they’re going to look at what else you have to offer to the team and to the school. du Lac says you’ll be the men’s captain in the fall, and I think this experience will help you prepare.”  
  
“She’s right,” du Lac interjects. “This could be really good experience for you and will definitely influence your personal recommendations.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Arthur says, “but I don’t see how tutoring some wannabe drop-out will help my running, Coach. I get average grades at best anyway.”  
  
“Oh no,” du Lac says. “You won’t be  _tutoring_  him. You’ll be helping him prep for the fall cross country season.”  
  
Something in Arthur’s stomach spasms as if a hand has wrenched a fist around his gut. “What?” he croaks.  
  
Ms. Smith pats him on the shoulder. “Merlin’s teachers have struggled to find ways of motivating him. We think putting him in a team environment might help.”  
  
“You mean  _forcing_  him.”  
  
du Lac shifts a little uncomfortably, as if he isn’t completely onboard with this plan. After all, it is his team in question. “We’ll see how it goes this summer. I wouldn’t ask anyone else to do this, Arthur. You’re really passionate about your running.”  
  
And that’s what seals Arthur’s fate. He _is_ passionate about his running, and if du Lac forces this Emrys kid onto anyone else, Arthur wouldn’t trust him to not screw up the team. After all, Arthur placed third last year in the state championships and has spent his whole life under his father’s direction running in junior regional competitions. “Does he know about this yet?”  
  
The two teachers glance at each other before Ms. Smith half-smiles half-grimaces again. “We’re working on it,” she says.   
  
\----  
  
du Lac calls him the first week of summer to inform him that Merlin can meet him anytime next week. Arthur shrugs into the phone and decides they might as well start on a Monday. He sits with his phone, peering out the window at the sunshine and sighs, reminding himself it will only cost him an hour each day.  
  
“Is there anything you want him to bring?” du Lac asks.  
  
“I dunno. Shoes. And no flannel. Tell him to meet me at my house at seven.” He picks at the dirt on the bottom of his shoes.   
  
“He tells me he can’t meet before 11. It’s the only time he can get a ride into town.”  
  
“I prefer to run earlier in the morning.”   
  
“There’s a reason Leon keeps calling you Prince Arthur, isn’t there?” du Lac says. “I’m not here to hold your hand through this whole process. You’re helping him out so you need to communicate with him. Here’s his number so you can work something out yourself.” He adds a little wryly, “Enjoy your summer, Pendragon.”  
  
Out of pettiness, Arthur refuses to call Merlin. “Let him have his way,” he snipes at his reflection in the mirror that afternoon. He regrets it when three days later he ends up sitting at his stoop at 11, irritated that his schedule has been interrupted. Down the street, he sees the grill of a car and almost hopes it’s the stupid loser. After all, ‘the sooner you do start, the sooner it’s done,’ his father says when ordering Arthur to do his chores.   
  
Instead, it’s Gaius’s familiar Buick puttering down the road coming into work. Arthur’s father, Uther, runs a privately owned mechanic garage attached to their house called Camelot Repairs. Arthur despairs over the name. There is nothing stately about monkey suits and grease, especially not in a town like Tadita with only 5,000 people.   
  
It’s not that Arthur hates the shop exactly. The jokes about his name get old, but his dad puts in an honest day’s work, and everyone in the town comes to him whenever they have a problem. Even Arthur has gotten pretty good at doing the simple tasks like oil changes and tire rotations so he can help out and make some pocket cash. There’s pride in this little business Uther built from the ground up—Arthur won’t deny that—but in the larger world it doesn’t mean much, and Arthur looks eagerly ahead to college.   
  
Arthur argues out loud that leaving means getting out of Tadita, a small unknown cow-town at the edge of the state, even if he’s unsure about what to study in college. When people ask after his plans, he presses his lips into a thin line and says, “I don’t know yet. I do admire my father’s entrepreneurship. Maybe I’ll go into business studies like the old man.” Uther’s friends chortle and pat him on the back; his teachers encourage him for having strong goals. Gaius, the elderly but sharp-minded man who does Uther’s office work, raises an eyebrow, and his lips curve into the shadow of a smirk. Arthur stops parroting his rehearsed answers around him.   
  
He tries not to talk about it with his father. Sometimes Arthur thinks Uther isn’t really a man anymore. Instead he is a walking husk of regret: regret over Arthur’s mother, regret over not being a more available parent, for not knowing how to cook properly or do laundry without losing the socks. They never talk about these things ever. Instead Uther stalks the house silently, a lion in a cage, and even if Arthur thinks he’s wrong, Uther is always, always right.   
  
They discuss it once in the kitchen while Arthur hovers over the stove. Uther sits at the peninsula  with a ledger and his old, brittle carbon copy, a pen in one hand and a tumbler of whiskey to his left. “Do you know what you plan on studying after you graduate high school?”   
  
Arthur stirs the pot once and then twice, testing the noodles. “I haven’t decided yet.”  
  
“You must have some sort of an idea.”  
  
“Lots of people go in undecided, Dad.”  
  
Uther sips at his drink, watching the liquid slosh against the sides as he stirs it slowly for a long moment. “I didn’t know either. Now look at where I am.”  
  
Around other people Arthur says he wants to leave Tadita—it’s too small for a big man like him. To himself he knows he wants to leave his father.   
  
From inside the garage, Arthur can hear Uther’s low tones as he prices a repair for a customer. Though he can’t see the man, he can imagine the way he stands with his feet at shoulder’s width apart, arms crossed over his chest or maybe holding a catalog for the customer to look at. Arthur tries to imagine himself twenty years from now in the same position. Then he draws his knees to his chest and watches the approaching car crawl down the street.   
  
When Gaius pulls up the driveway, Arthur is surprised to see he has a passenger, an unruly haired teenager sitting in the front seat. “Good morning, Arthur,” Gaius says, exiting the car. “I’m sure you know my nephew, Merlin.”  
  
Arthur gapes a little and can’t help but exclaim, “Merlin is your nephew?”  
  
Gaius quirks an eyebrow heavenward and wears a put-upon expression. “Indeed,” he says before entering the garage.  
  
Merlin rolls his eyes and clambers out, leaning against the hood of the car with a sour expression. He glares at the sun as if unused to it, and settles for staring absently somewhere to Arthur’s left.  
  
“You know you can’t smoke pot when you’re on the team,” Arthur blurts out, his gaze catching on Merlin’s ugly hemp bracelet around his bony wrist. It’s not really a proper introduction and he winces internally, though it is a valid point.  
  
“God, you’re a real dick,” the boy says and argues, “I don’t do pot.” He pauses, flicking some invisible fuzz off of his ratty shirt, thankfully not flannel, and adds, “Often.” He grins stupidly as if he thinks he’s clever.  
          
Arthur exhales a slow breath and remembers what du Lac said about scholarships and leadership. “All right, let’s head over to the track then.”  
  
Merlin doesn’t budge and folds his arms over his chest. “Can we just say we ran? I’m certain you don’t want to do this anymore than I do.”  
  
It’s a tempting offer, but Arthur’s stubborn and likes to think true to his word. “No, we’re going to run. I actually enjoy it, and I heard that if you don’t do this, they’ll flunk you and keep you an extra year.”  
  
“They can’t actually do that, you know. Are you seriously that gullible?”  
  
“Are you seriously this lazy? We’ll run a mile or something, tops. Work you into it. Though in your shape, I don’t know if three months is enough time to get you to run even two miles.”  
  
Merlin glowers and balls his hands into fists. It’s laughable really. He’s so scrawny and ungainly that the force of his punch would feel like wind on a breezy day. He takes two angry steps forward and stumbles over his feet, his face growing hot.   
  
Arthur bursts out laughing. “Riiiiight. Not a stoner. I doubt you’ll even be able to run three yards without scraping your face up. Might even be an improvement.”  
  
“Fuck you,” Merlin retorts.  
  
“No,” Arthur responds cheerily. “Because if you don’t do this, you’ll be the one that’s fucked—right out of being able to graduate. Come on, I’d drive us to the track, but I wouldn’t want your sorry ass in my Camaro.”  
  
For a moment, Merlin looks like he might actually hit Arthur this time. He inhales an angry breath before snarling, “No, you know what? Forget it. I don’t want to deal with some big-headed jock. I don’t even fucking care about graduating.” He spits on the sidewalk and stalks off down the road in the direction he arrived in.  
  
Arthur lets him go, a little relieved and guilty. He doesn’t know whether to laugh or chase after him and settles for kicking a clump of grass half-heartedly before turning back towards the house. He stops when he sees Uther leaning against the open garage, his arms folded over his chest in his blue work shirt. His mouth goes dry.  
  
“I want you to know that Gaius is a very old friend of mine,” his father says, standing erect like a statue. “And I want you to know that responsibility is never easy.”  
  
Arthur nods, his hot-headedness grown cool under Uther’s stare. “Yes, Father,” he says.  
  
“Don’t make me take that car from you, son.”  
  
“Yes, Father.”  
  
Uther spares one last pointed look at Merlin’s retreating figure before returning to the depth of the garage, and Arthur rolls his eyes a little and scowls before climbing into his run-down Camaro.   
  
The car has no AC and it’s hot. All Arthur wants to do is grab Merlin and drive to the track as fast as possible. He even half-contemplates pretending to collect Merlin if he knew if father wouldn’t find out in the end. Arthur pulls out of the driveway in reluctant pursuit of the dejected figure, rolls the window down and forces himself to say, “I was only joking you know. I was going to give you a ride. I wasn’t serious, all right? Now will you get inside?”  
  
Merlin snorts and looks at him, his blue eyes sharp and calculating as he continues to walk. “Do you always bully people? Are you a pervert who gets off on pushing people around?”  
  
“What? No! What the hell?” Arthur says, his foot jerking on the brake pedal. The car rolls forward.  
  
“You can’t order me around,” Merlin says.  
  
“Technically, as captain I can,” he retorts, reveling a little at being able to say that.  
  
“Then you can turn the car around and go home.”  
  
Merlin keeps walking without looking at him, and Arthur throws his head back against the headrest in frustration. “Look, what is it that you want? Don’t you even care that you’re, like, going to fail out of high school? You need to do this.”   
  
“What, I need to do this like you need to be a jack ass about everything?”  
  
Arthur squeezes his eyes shut, hating himself just a little bit before saying, “Look, I’m sorry. Please get into the car,” in his most pleasant voice.  
  
Merlin studies him a little before snorting again, and Arthur half-thinks he won’t comply. “Well, pull-over then,” he says finally, coming around the front of the Camaro. “But don’t think I’m doing this just because you asked nicely.”  
  
Merlin hops in and leans on his fist sullenly. Arthur almost feels bad for goading him if he weren’t such an easy target. He turns on the radio and hesitates before reluctantly saying, “Go on and choose a station then.”  
  
Merlin jabs at a random preset button and mutters, “All the stations are crap,” returning to lean on his fist. The rest of the ride is silent except for the Top 40 music and the wind from the open windows.  
  
They arrive at the outdoor track and Arthur leads him to some arbitrary starting line. “I won’t have you run very far today. Just take a couple easy laps and I’ll watch your form and stuff.” He leaves him to climb up the bleachers, and then waves at him to start. He can see Merlin huff a little and imagines him wearing the same surly expression he’s worn all morning as he readies himself in some sort of mock-start up position like they do in the movies.   
  
When Merlin starts running, Arthur fully expects to be able to ridicule everything about him: his flailing, erratic arms, his ungainliness. The thing, he realizes, is that despite Merlin’s penchant for laziness and his inability to walk two feet without tripping over something, he’s fast. For a moment, Arthur’s stunned by the way Merlin’s legs stretch out before him as he strips around the track. And perhaps his hair looks a little ridiculous as the wind whips through it, and his ears are hardly aerodynamic, but still, Arthur finds himself breathing along to the rhythm of Merlin’s footfalls, growing lightheaded and sun-bleached in the stands.  
  
Merlin slows to a halt after a couple of minutes at the bottom of the bleachers. “Can I stop now?” he hollers up, clambering over the metal seats. He’s barely panting but a slight sheen of sweat has formed at the neck of his t-shirt.  
  
“What?” Arthur asks.  
  
“Can I stop? Now? You said, run the track. I ran the track.”  
  
“What? No! How many laps did you do?”  
  
Merlin lifts one eyebrow at him. “Weren’t you watching? I ran two laps.”  
  
Arthur scoffs, adopting his most authoritative and demeaning tone in a feeble attempt to cover the fact that he actually hadn’t been counting. “Merlin, don’t tell me you’re tired already.”  
  
“Hardly.” Merlin folds his harms over his chest and huffs.  
  
And perhaps it’s something about Merlin that inspires Arthur to react childishly as he has done all morning, setting his hands on his hips as he sneers from his position two rows up. “Oh yeah, Prove it then,” he says.  
  
Merlin stomps back down the bleachers and mutters, “Fine, I will.”  
  
Arthur shakes his head and wonders if anyone else ever tried goading Merlin into doing something or if they just assumed he was incapable.   
  
“Are you watching this time?” Merlin bellows. Without waiting, his legs kick out from under his body as he sprints around the track. Arthur fumbles for the stopwatch around his neck and resolves to focus on counting the laps this time.   
  
After Merlin runs another five laps, it’s apparent how exhausted he’s become. His initial grace peters out into a clumsy wobble, and at every corner he turns to glare at Arthur over his shoulder. Each time his half-hearted trot devolves into walking, Arthur leaps up from his seat and yells, “Come on, you girly wimp! My Aunt Judy runs faster than you and she’s had both hips replaced!” By the end of the last lap, Merlin has his hands clutched to his side, and he collapses dramatically two feet from the start line.  
  
Arthur stomps down the bleacher steps, scowling. He nudges forcefully at Merlin’s prone body as Merlin pants, “Arthur… please… no… more.” His bony fingers reach out to clutch at Arthur’s ankles, and Arthur, unmoved and heartless, glares down at him.  
  
“Oh for Christ’s sake,” he grunts, grimacing as he slides his hands under Merlin’s damp armpits to hoist him up. “You know you  _barely_  ran a mile and a half, right? And God, you reek.”  
  
“How far do I have to go again?”   
  
“A 5k,  _Merlin_ ,” he says, swatting him across the head. “That’s 3.1 miles.”  
  
“Nrgh,” Merlin groans and slides back down to the ground. His cheek presses into the rubber surface of the track, and when he lifts his head, black tiny polyurethane granules cling to his skin. “This is death. Why couldn’t they have just given me detention again?”  
  
“The ‘again’ suggests detention stopped working on you.”  
  
Merlin laughs weakly, still a little out of breath. “Yes, well. The goal is to get three detentions. Then you achieve in school suspension. Have you ever gotten in school, Arthur? All you do is sleep.”  
  
For a moment, Arthur looks at him with a baffled expression and wants to say, ‘That’s what you call  _achievement?_ ’ But then he remembers that this is Merlin, the kid renowned for cutting English to smoke pot down by the creek behind the school lot—that the whole reason they wound up together is that Merlin needs a little direction and Arthur needs to build up his résumé for scholarships with charity case losers.  
  
Later, after Merlin has lolled about on the track and Arthur has demanded no less than seven times that he get up, they meander out of the stadium together.   
  
“You’ll need to buy some decent shoes,” Arthur says, pointing to the tattered Chuck Taylors on Merlin’s feet. “When I said bring a pair of sneakers, I didn’t mean something you hauled out of the dumpster.”  
  
“What’s wrong with these?” Merlin huffs, lifting his left foot up to inspect the sole. He tugs a little where the fabric meets the rubber and shrugs when it separates, leaving a hole clear through to his sock.  
  
“You’ll ruin your feet without a good pair,” Arthur says, exercising his most put-upon tone of voice. “Do you need help finding some?”  
  
“Like there’s a place to buy them in this hick town. I’ll just go to the library and order a pair or something off the internet,” Merlin says. He flushes and stammers then says, “I mean—our internet. It’s down right now, so…”  
  
Arthur studies him briefly, the way he refuses to meet his eye suddenly and instead toes the cracks in the black top with great interest. Arthur wants to ask how it’s even possible to not have internet in his home, but stops and reconsiders Merlin’s shoes, the fraying tops of his socks. “You could come with me to buy a pair when I drive over to buy shop supplies. You wouldn’t even know what to pick out so… I could help?” he says, and then adds, “Gaius will probably go with me anyway. You might as well tag along.”   
  
They reach the gate to the parking lot. Arthur’s old beat up Camaro glistens in the sun from hours spent being polished. From their angle, it almost looks as if it had never been bought after nearly being demolished in an accident.   
  
“Look,” Merlin says. “I’m sure I can figure it out on my own. But, um, thanks.”  
  
“Uh, sure,” Arthur responds less than eloquently.   
  
They stare at each other for a moment before Merlin jerks his thumb behind him awkwardly and says, “Well! I’ll just be going that way, and um, you’ll be going the… other way…”  
  
“Yeah, uh right. To my car.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“Right, I will see you tomorrow then?”  
  
“Sure.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“Right,” Merlin says, half-smiling and half-grimacing before turning to walk away. He spares Arthur a half-hearted wave before tripping over the curb, and he doesn’t look back after righting himself.  
  
Arthur snorts loudly and without dignity and then pauses for a moment, partly relieved that Merlin has rejected his offer. Arthur hasn’t even told his friends about his little side project that Mr. du Lac foisted onto him yet, and he hopes that nobody finds out until cross country actually begins at the end of summer. But more surprisingly he feels a little disappointed. Why wouldn’t Merlin want to go with him? He was the captain after all, and Arthur was supposed to be guiding him or something. He should make it  _required_  that Merlin partake in some lousy trip to the city for auto parts—especially since Uther was sending Arthur along with Merlin’s old uncle, Gaius.  
  
Not that Arthur wants to spend the day out in Rogers with Merlin, he decides. Spending a day with Gaius is bad enough with his eyebrow and his quiet disapproval of Arthur’s driving. And whatever, if Arthur’s father needs these parts so badly then he and Gaius could go while Arthur watches the shop.   
  
Arthur revs the Camaro a little roughly—testing its weak transmission—before pulling out of the parking lot. The gears shift clumsily. He drives home thinking about the rest of the summer and the impossible quest du Lac has ordered him on to make something of Merlin so the freak can graduate.   
  
He absolutely does not think about Merlin’s stride or the defiant look on his face that suggested he might yet prove them all wrong.  
  
\----          
  
A week of running later, Merlin hasn’t acquired a decent pair of running shoes, and the soles of his Chuck Taylors have new holes worn clear through the bottom. Arthur takes one look at them as Merlin ties them up and grabs him off the track and to his car.   
  
At first glance, one would expect running to be a fairly inexpensive sport. Cross country is not like swimming. It requires neither swimsuit nor cap nor goggles. Running doesn’t require padding or a ball or special instruments to hit said ball. Running requires a body.  
  
And—well—shoes.  
  
The tons of shoes Arthur has worn could fill every closet in their small ranch-style home. When he drags Merlin into his home, he doesn’t expect the embarrassment he feels when he sees Merlin’s gaping, fish-like expression at all the running paraphernalia the Pendragons keep. The walls of their cramped living room are adorned with medals and pictures of Arthur’s mother cut out from old college newspapers. The shoes she used to lead her alma mater to win nationals her final year in 1984 hang on the wall.  
  
Arthur keeps his own private collection of awards and bibs shoved unceremoniously into a shoebox kept under the bed. But in the same way Uther keeps his late wife alive through the shrine-like arrangement of photos and clippings, he has no problem flaunting every one of Arthur’s achievements, no matter how small. Arthur shoves a pair of child’s Nikes on display on a shelf out of Merlin’s sightline, flushing hotly with sudden embarrassment, and drags him into his bedroom.  
  
“So…” Merlin starts, a small smirk in the corner of his mouth. But it’s less cruel than Arthur expects. He might even go as far as describing that smile as near-fondness. “You really like running then.”  
  
“It was my mom’s thing. Father doesn’t really run anymore, but I’m good at it, so…” He shrugs awkwardly, unused to speaking about this. No one’s ever questioned why he likes to run, just accepts that he does and is good at it.  
  
“Anyway,” he says, changing the subject. “You need good shoes. Now I don’t know if these will fit the shape of your foot, but they’ll have to do for now until we can get you some new ones. Watch out.” He walks to the closet door and opens it, stepping aside as a pile of shoes comes tumbling out. Merlin gapes as Arthur rummages through the pile in search of the least beat up looking pair. Finally, he chooses one—seemingly arbitrarily to Merlin—and hands them over. “They’re my old ones. The soles are worn down, but they’ll keep you upright for now.”  
  
“What’s so special about a pair of running shoes?”  
  
Arthur rolls his eyes. “People run weird. They have weird biomechanics that cause their ankles to roll inward or outward, or they land on their heels. Shoes help correct those quirks.”  
  
Merlin laughs a little in bewilderment. “Well, thanks,” he says. “I guess I know where to go now when I’m in need of shoes. You could clothe all of Africa with those.”  
  
Arthur lets out a surprised bark of laughter before boxing Merlin’s ears. “Come on, we’re going three miles today!” he says with faux-cheerfulness, dragging Merlin out the door.  
  
\----  
  
Gaius pulls Arthur aside to congratulate him for taking on such a daunting case as his nephew. It’s mid-July, a month into summer, and the humidity presses heavily against Arthur’s skin. “Not everyone’s willing to give him a chance,” Gaius says, and adds wryly, “It’s very kind of you, though I’ve been made aware that he’s not doing this by choice.”  
  
To his surprise, Arthur finds himself responding, “He’s not actually half-bad,” and then spends the rest of the day wondering if his body has been abducted by some alien pod person, or if the approach of an oncoming thunderstorm has tricked his brain into complimenting Merlin.  
  
Gaius’s remark raises questions for Arthur. How could someone so rude and delinquent as Merlin be related to someone like his father’s shop assistant? For as long as Arthur can remember, Gaius has been a quiet and venerable presence in the shop. Reduced to office work part-time due to his age, he once worked alongside Uther on repairs, and Arthur’s father never hired a new mechanic as a replacement. Gaius, who perhaps calls in ill less than once a year, could in no way have raised Merlin, who manages suspension four times in one semester and is notorious for flunking phys ed repeatedly.   
  
That afternoon, the clouds unleash hell in the form of rain and hail. Arthur and Merlin get caught five miles out of town on County Road B where they drove out to run hills, and to Arthur’s dismay, the Camaro’s transmission bonks out when they try to drive home again. So Arthur’s not feeling very generous and benevolent, what with the hail denting his beautiful baby on the side of the road and his feet developing blisters from walking home in wet shoes, when he says, “Well how about it then? How come you’re living with Gaius?” It’s not the most tactful investigation into Merlin’s life, but Arthur’s itching for Merlin to react with something more than benign apathy.  
  
They hover in the bathroom, trailing mud wherever they go. Merlin shrugs and snatches Arthur’s towel from his hands, running it through his rain-drenched hair. “Just have been, I suppose.”  
  
“You suppose,” Arthur says nonplussed.  
  
“He moved in when my mom went crazy, stayed when she moved out,” Merlin clarifies, chucking the towel into the sink.  
  
And, okay, that clarifies nothing for Arthur, who is now not only irritated but baffled and growing increasingly angry at the puddles gathering wherever Merlin treads. “Look, can you stop walking everywhere for a second?”  
  
Merlin shrugs again and ignores him in favor of ambling into the kitchen to fish out something to drink from the fridge—without permission of course. Damp footprints mark his path from the bathroom. Arthur chases after him, grabbing him by the shoulders to haul him back with Merlin clutching the refrigerator handle valiantly and having the gall to laugh into his can of Arizona Tea.  
  
“Ugh! Let! Go!” Arthur commands, loosening each of Merlin’s fingers one-by-one, only to have them clamp down again when released. He is grateful for this sudden distraction, this petty quarrel that prevents him from thinking too carefully about Merlin’s slipped confession. Merlin drips all over Arthur’s freshly changed clothes seemingly with intention, and Arthur finally just says, “Fuck it,” tackling him, splattering tea everywhere and generally causing a larger mess than there had been before.  
  
He pins Merlin to the ground by bracing his knees on either side of his hips and uses his hands to hold him in a full nelson so that no matter how Merlin twists or bucks, it’s impossible to throw him off. Merlin yells some combination of “Fine! Uncle! I’m saying Uncle!” and “Eat shit!” and “Geroff, you fatso,” before Arthur relents, but only to drag him by the heels into the bathroom as Merlin’s head bounces against the tiles.  
  
Back in front of the mirror where Arthur scowls, combing tea out of his hair, Merlin hoists himself onto the counter and gingerly pokes at his carpet burn. He swings his feet a little and says, “I was ten when we moved in with Gaius. She was depressed—my mom—but I didn’t really know that then. Gaius isn’t even my proper uncle. He and Mom were half-siblings.”   
  
“What happened to her?”  
  
“Dunno. She left shortly afterwards. Gaius tells me she thought she’d make it harder for me if she stayed. I used to get cards for Christmas and stuff.” He shrugs again, too blandly to be unaffected.  
  
“Do you like living with Gaius?”  
  
“It’s not half-bad.”  
  
Arthur studies Merlin and can imagine what it must have been like: Gaius—with no children of his own and past his prime—being saddled with Merlin but having no clue what to do with him. In the past month, Arthur has discovered that Merlin is unbearably curious, rooting through the shop and hovering over Arthur as he works on the Camaro before their runs. He lacks a censor, says whatever he wants and pursues whatever he wants. Of course he would wind up in detention, endlessly frustrating his superiors. It makes Arthur wonder briefly if Merlin only continues their running experiment because he  _wants_  to—if he would walk away the moment he lost interest.   
  
“My mom died when I was three,” Arthur offers, pausing his diligent grooming. “She got in a car accident when the brakes malfunctioned. It’s why my father’s so serious about mechanics.”  
  
Arthur does not add, “It’s why I run,” or, “It’s why my father does not run.”  
  
Merlin hums and says nothing.  
  
\----  
  
Arthur grows used to a daily schedule that involves bullying Merlin into runs. At first it’s apparent that Merlin tries to do anything to avoid going, but Gaius always drives him in at the same time he arrives to work in the shop. Merlin pretends to forget his shoes (of which Arthur has many more of) or feigns a headache, but it doesn’t take much goading and insulting from Arthur (“Oh does poor wittle Merwin’s head have an owie? Poor baby”) to get him up on his feet.  
  
One day Merlin legitimately injures himself by tripping over a stack of tires. He flails spectacularly—which Arthur first laughs at—and crashes down violently on his right knee. When it bruises and swells to nearly twice its size, Arthur thinks the knee cap has shattered and spends a good half-hour being talked down by Gaius from driving Merlin to the hospital in Rogers.   
  
“Look, you big bully. It’s just bruised. If anything I’ll get out of going on your boot camp runs for a couple of days.” Merlin props his knee on the stack of tires Arthur is busily rebuilding. “Get me an ice pack, won’t you?”  
  
“I don’t like it.” Arthur drops a tire next to Merlin’s chair and sits down, leaning over the leg. He prods it with gross fascination. “Nothing swells and bruises that fast without being broken.”   
  
“Well if you stop touching it, it might heal faster. That hurts.”  
  
“You know, Merlin,” Gaius says, looking up from an auto parts catalog, “If you minded your surroundings like a responsible person this wouldn’t have happened.”  
  
Merlin rolls his eyes and swats at Arthur’s hand. Then he throws his head back and moans dramatically. “It’s not my fault. Arthur was distracting me.”  
  
“Talking. I was talking to you. Most people can walk and listen at the same time.”  
  
“But there were obstacles.”  
  
Arthur’s hand gets swatted away again and he crosses his arms. “Well at least let me wrap it for you. It’ll help the swelling go down. Compression and stuff.”  
  
“You know what helps swelling? Ice.”  
  
“Fine, but I still say it’s broken.”   
  
Arthur leaves and returns with an Ace bandage and a gel ice pack that Merlin snatches from him immediately. Instead of laying it on his leg, he amuses himself by pressing it against his forehead to combat the grimy humidity of the garage.   
  
“Keep your knee straight,” Arthur says as he unwinds the tape. He wraps it around Merlin’s leg carefully, his knuckles brushing the inside of his knee with every pass. Merlin watches him with hooded eyes from under the shadow of the ice pack.   
  
When he’s finally convinced of no injury, he spends the rest of their allotted time together bullying Merlin about his insufferable clumsiness, but in a way that makes Merlin laugh and chuck clumps of grass at Arthur in retaliation.  
  
—  
  
Which leads to multiple days Arthur is careful not to tally spent tracking deer trails in the woods behind the shop or lolling in the front yard after particularly gruesome runs. Merlin even stops complaining the first time he finishes three miles, laughing, before pretending to pass out. Arthur lets him lie there for a generous five minutes before reviving him with a super soaker he dug out from the attic. And if Arthur refuses to recognize these moments of near-friendship once they’re over, he certainly is unwilling to acknowledge the silent nights he spends contemplating the ripple of muscle when Merlin runs or the corners of Merlin’s eyes when he grins—always cheekily—growing more and more frequent.  
  
Arthur denies himself a lot of things, but most of all he denies contemplating the start of school looming closer every day. He’s kept the training runs with Merlin to himself, moments he unfolds and studies in the dark with both hands fisted beneath his pillow. It’s like thinking about his mother: there are questions that cannot be answered in the light of day but only speculated on at night.  
  
Then there are the times when Arthur finds himself incapable of even facing Merlin head-on, like when Gaius gets called in for some late-night repairs and Merlin tags along. They lay out in the grass a half-foot apart, quietly, as if their breaths possessed their own language. In these moments Arthur is afraid that he might do something irrational, might touch him, might walk along side him in the halls, might call him for inexplicable reasons. He ends up not saying anything at all when Merlin clambers back inside Gaius’s Buick, peering out at him from inside the window as they drive away.

\--

He meets Morgan for lunch at the small local eatery that serves pie with every meal. It’s a student favorite, the restaurant split in the middle by some invisible force that keeps the flat-chested, obnoxious middle schoolers on one side and the cool, mature high schoolers on the other. A week from now, once school starts, this place will be virtually empty during the day, replaced by elderly folk and the euchre club while the students are trapped indoors. 

Morgan has already commandeered a booth, and Arthur must navigate between some sort of a retro radio fan club (the nineties) that has swarmed three separate tables and brought a boom box,  and the theatre and drama club (equally as weird) to reach her. Arthur distrusts any sort of organization that chooses to meet during the summer besides—of course—cross country. On the table she spreads out a fan of rosters and running routes and a little doodle of last year’s state champion plaque that went to those bastards at Stanley High. Before he can even sit down, she shoves papers in his hands.

“These are all the routes I’ve mapped out for us to run in the fall, listed in chronological order by distance in both miles and kilometers.” Most of the routes are familiar, but the last three Arthur doesn’t recognize, and they’re listed out of order. They cover ground around Orenda Lake, the old Wakanda Trail that runs along the river. It’s hardly wide enough to fit two people, and the branches and vines make it treacherous at best.

“I don’t know, Morgan,” he says with a frown. “Do you really think these last few are safe?”

“Oh,” she says, flipping her ponytail. “Those aren’t included in the official list. Those are just for you and Merlin.”

Arthur freezes, his fingers curling tightly around the edges of the paper. “What?” he asks. He planned to keep Morgan in the dark about his daily schedule with Merlin.

“Honestly, Arthur. You think I didn’t know? du Lac told me right after he spoke to you, that I should look out for him in the fall. Anyway, I figured he would be more...  _enthused_  about running with you if you took him someplace interesting.”

“Interesting. What’s interesting about a muddy pond full of guppies?”

“Maybe not interesting to you, you twit. Not all of us are douches who spend our free time in front of the mirror primping. Merlin is interested in wildlife. He says he would like to study ecology someday.” 

“Well aren’t you special, holding out your hand to every charity case,” he snaps. “These trails aren’t very safe for running unless you want the both of us to come limping in with sprained ankles. Besides, I’m not here to talk to Merlin about his feelings; it’s not a date. I’m just here to get him off his ass.” He doesn’t want to admit that no, he didn’t know Merlin likes something as ridiculous and precious as nature. He hadn’t even considered that Merlin might have plans after high school. For so long, Merlin has built a reputation in Arthur’s mind as one of the losers to be left behind in Tadita after graduation—what Arthur always fears will happen to himself if he doesn’t get out on scholarship. “We’re doing fine, Morgan.”

“Well excuse me,” she retorts. “I just thought you’d like some help, but I guess you and Merlin have been getting along better than expected. Maybe you’ve even started to like him. Might do you some good to hang out with people in possession of actual brains.”

Arthur feels his face flush. Morgan has always been able to get underneath his skin even when she’s trying to be helpful. And Arthur doesn’t want her help, doesn’t need it. He has the Merlin thing under control. “Lay off,” he says, gathering his bag. “You forget that the friends you keep insulting are on the same team as you. I think we’re done here, yeah?” 

He stalks out of the diner, trailing his track bag behind him. He storms off to the Camaro, slamming the door shut after he clambers in and shoves the key into the starter. After starting the ignition, he rests his forehead on the steering wheel.

Things with Merlin, he decides, have been going too well. So well, in fact, that for the third weekend in a row, Arthur has blown off spending the evening with Zach in favor of a few late night runs with Merlin, trying to get him to smile that same fond grin Merlin spares him at seemingly random occasions with no rhyme or reason. And spending every day out on the road can’t help. Of course Morgan would know about the runs, and if she or anyone sees them together at any moment when Arthur is dragging Merlin down to the beach—or pushing him into the park fountain—or sitting in lawn chairs in the shop with Arnold Palmers—or laughing—or—

No. It’s just not right that half of Arthur’s summer has gone to waste trying to get some nobody loser to graduate at the cost of his freedom and his friends, and he’s had enough. When he gets home, he fishes his phone from the bottom of his track bag and flips through his texts, skipping one from Merlin before reading one from Zach.

> Zach 2:14:26 PM
> 
> where u been. movie 2nite party at leahs after

  
Okay, he thinks. This is good; this what he wants. He has one week left of freedom to spend however he chooses and he’ll spend it with his friends.

And if Merlin sends him a text that says, ‘no running tonight. friend over, sorry’ Arthur ignores that fact that he feels less guilty—as if it somehow makes a difference that Merlin is busy anyway. 

\----

Arthur’s grand night out begins sitting in the parking lot at the cheap-o movie theatre that plays reels already released on DVD. They pass around a bottle of vodka, laughing and telling jokes before stumbling into the theatre—not drunk enough yet to be noticeable but pleasantly buzzed. They sit in one long row at the front, craning their necks so they can see every pore of Matthew McConaughey’s face. Zach makes fun by throwing popcorn at the screen: thirty points for nostril shots, fifty if he hits a nipple. As the alcohol thrums in Arthur’s veins, he panics mid-throw to consider McConaughey’s chest.  _Is it attractive?_  he thinks.  _Oh god, do I like—no, no I absolutely do not like_ —and then Leah leans over, presses a hand against his thigh in the unsubtle daring way adolescence allows and says, “Are you coming over tonight?” 

“Yeah—yeah,” he slurs, momentarily distracted by the sudden heat through his jeans.

He hears Zach mutter a quiet “shit” beside them, and through his peripherals Arthur can see Ashley—Zach’s on-and-off-again girlfriend, palming him through his crotch, sucking indelicately along his throat even while he fishes in the popcorn bucket for more. 

When Leah doesn’t remove her hand from Arthur’s thigh, Arthur reaches over, wrapping one arm around her shoulder and the other hand palming her jaw. He hesitates briefly, studying the thick outline of eyeliner and mascara on her face, inhaling the overpowering floral smell of perfume before drawing her up in a wet kiss, blocking out the harsh sounds Zach makes beside him.

Leah’s mouth feels sticky with a trace flavor of Skittles that he must explore, tilting her head back to plunder her mouth. He groans when she takes his lower lip between her teeth, his hips shifting under the invisible weight of lust. This—this is what he wants, and it’s so good when she laughs into his mouth, tugging a little on his hair.

When they leave the theatre, Arthur’s a little drunk on vodka and making out and the feel of Leah’s small waist in his hands. The four of them pile into the Camaro, Ashley and Zach pressed against each other in the back, passing the vodka bottle back and forth. Arthur has enough sense to keep away from it while driving, but still feels intoxicated and aroused. They drive around aimlessly for awhile, yelling along to the radio, pausing at stoplights and intersections to French messily and wetly. Leah wants to ride around the lake, thinks it might be romantic, and Arthur acquiesces, if only she will kiss him again, run her hand along his inseam while he drives.

Then Zach sees it— _them_ —first on the south end of Orenda Lake, two vague shadows tucked together on the bank. He presses his hands against the car window and yells, “Arthur! Stop the car! Stop the car!” And at first Arthur has no idea what he’s talking about, thinks that there’s an opossum on the road or a deer until Zach yells, “Shit! It’s that guy! From English who cuts class all the time!”

Arthur tenses then, fingers clenching around the wheel as he mutters, “What are you talking about?” even though he sees them now, two figures on the bank, the taller one—the lankier one—undeniably familiar to Arthur from their summer spent together. He has to slam hard on his brakes when Zach shoves his car door open mid-drive, the passengers’ bodies lurching forward against the restraints.

In the backseat, Ashley laughs and says, “What are you doing, Zach? Get in the car,” without any real sincerity. She begins to unbuckle her seatbelt and follow him.

“Guys!” Arthur yells. “Come on, get back in the ca—Leah, come on, put your seatbelt back on.”

Zach pokes his head in the window and says, “Arthuuuuur. Let’s go have some fun. Aren’t they having fun over there?”  
          
Arthur looks at Merlin and the stranger, both aware of the presence of the Camaro and people piling out of it. They’re too far away for him to see their expressions, but he can see the proximity of their bodies, both leaned up against the trunk of a tree. “Get back in the car,” Arthur repeats, a little quieter and less sure of himself.  

“Come on ladies!” Zach hollers. “Let’s leave Arthur in the car. We’re going to have fun without him!” He swings his arms over Ashley and Leah’s shoulders and makes the descent towards the bank. Arthur stumbles out after them with a sick feeling settling in his gut. He eyes up the stranger and wishes he could leave except for the fact that Zach would never get home in his state.

Merlin pushes off the tree at their approach and stands defensively, feet shoulder-width apart and his hands over his chest. “Can I help you?” he asks.

Behind him, the other boy relaxes coolly against the tree and snorts, “Good one, Merlin. No wonder you get beat up.”

“Shut up, Will,” Merlin says tensely, watching the intruders carefully.

“Merlin?” Zach cackles, swaying a little. “Ladies, this queer’s name is Merlin!” The girls laugh. Arthur freezes at the top of the bank.

“Hey!” the boy—Will—snaps, straightening up. “Lay off of him.”

“Ooooooh. Merlin, it looks like I offended your boyfriend!”

“I said knock it off!”

“Will, stop it,” Merlin orders. “Can’t you tell he’s drunk? He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”

Will relents a little. “Do you know any of these people?”

Merlin glances furtively at Arthur some distance away and shakes his head. “No. I mean, we go to school together and stuff.”

Zach snorts and breaks away from the girls, coming up to jab Merlin in the sternum. “Nice, Merlin. Very e-lo-quent. All that pot you smoke does you a lot of good.”

“Fuck you,” Merlin bites. He doesn’t back away from Zach’s advances, and Arthur’s pulse picks up speed, watching their altercation.

“I bet you wish you could, don’t you?” Zach snarls lowly. 

“That’s it,” Will snaps, coming from behind Merlin to push Zach away. “Get out of here, you dick.”

“Do you call me a dick because you want me, faggot?”

Ashley simpers a little and tugs on Zach’s wrist. “Come on, let’s go. I’m getting bored.”

“No,” Zach refuses, stumbling drunkenly. “No, these guys are bothering me, so I don’t think I’m going to go.”

“Fine, stay here. We’ll go.” Will hooks his hand under Merlin’s elbow and starts to steer him towards the road. The casual touch causes something to press heavily against Arthur’s sternum and he turns away as they try to pass him.

Zach storms up the embankment and latches onto Will’s ankle. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” he yells. “Did I say you could leave?” He jerks on his leg and pulls him into the dirt, and instinctively, Will yanks Merlin with him. Arthur’s less than an arm’s length away and reaches forward and catches him around the ribs to stop him from crashing against the ground. Without thinking, he hauls Merlin backwards, drawing his back tight to his torso as their friends fight.

Will lets go and immediately attacks Zach, ramming his fist into his gut, but he’s not as strong as Zach either, who grabs him around his middle and spins him to the ground. Merlin tries to run down the bank as Zach rounds on Will, but Arthur refuses to let go, holding him tight by the waist.

“Let me go,” Merlin snaps, bracing his hands against Arthur’s forearms.

Arthur struggles to hang onto him, surprised by his strength. “Merlin, no—Merlin, don’t go down there!”

“Just let go of me!”

Will drags Zach to the ground to wrestle, and they watch, Arthur a little buzzed still and pressed tight against the heat of Merlin’s body. He can feel his blood thrumming through his veins, smell the salt and soap of Merlin’s skin and realizes that he’s hard just from holding him so close. He drops his arms so quickly that Merlin stumbles when there’s nothing to push against. He sprints down the bank just in time to watch Zach shove Will into the lake. 

There’s a moment of dead silence as they watch the water ripple, a moment where nobody moves in shock. And then Will resurfaces, gasping for air as Merlin rushes to pull him out of the lake.

“Let’s get out of here.” Leah runs towards the car. Ashley and Zach turn around too, but Arthur stays a moment longer, watching Merlin reach out to grasp his friend’s hand in his own.

Then he runs faster than he ever has before.

\----

The summer ends on a muggy, sweltering day, but Arthur doesn’t have it in him to complain. For the past few days, Merlin has refused to show up to run when Gaius arrives for work, and he doubts today will be any different. He sits with one foot on the bumper of the Camaro, an oil stick in one hand and a rag in the other, staring out at the road for a sign of Gaius’s approaching Buick.

Uther slides out from under a pick-up truck on his dolly, and chucks a dirty cloth at his son’s head. “Can you stop hovering around the garage?” he barks, a little strung out from the heat. When Arthur only grunts in response, Uther mutters, “It’s like this kid you’re moping over is a girl.” 

And maybe Arthur should respond by saying, “Dad, he’s my responsibility. I told Coach I’d help him out,” or with something crass and masculine about tits and Merlin’s lack thereof. Instead, he stammers for an excuse and ends up shrugging, made weak by the summer heat. Uther scrutinizes him and Arthur blushes, but it’s not enough to make him leave the shop until Gaius arrives sans one passenger. 

He exits the shop and walks through the house aimlessly, opening the refrigerator, the cupboards, filling a glass of water under the tap that he takes two sips of before dumping it out. When he lies down on his bed, he thinks guiltily of two things: the warmth of Merlin’s body against his own and the angry betrayal on his face.

\----

The following morning, the first day of school starts out deceptively fine. Teachers hand out syllabi and discuss them for the entire period, reluctant to actually begin teaching. As seniors, they get to skip the stupid yearbook photos because of senior pictures, and Arthur spends that time strutting about the school, compiling a list of strange and bizarre things to collect over the course of the year to sneak into Morgan’s locker. 

For lunch, it’s nice enough outside that the students are excused to eat on the lawn. Arthur meets up with Zach to swap class schedules under a tree for their half hour break, and the rest of the time they leer at the girls in their class wearing tight shorts. It’s been a good morning and Arthur expects it to carry on throughout the afternoon. 

Of course, Arthur doesn’t expect to run into Merlin in the cafeteria when they dump their trays. He looks the same as ever, though Arthur doesn’t know what he expected to change over the past week. The only real difference is the scowl he gives Zach before maneuvering around them to dump his food out.

Bad idea, Arthur thinks. Zach sees it, decides to retaliate by chucking his apple core at him, and when Merlin tries to walk away, he grabs him by the shoulder and hauls him back. 

“Zach, knock it off,” Arthur says, trying to intervene, but something hard sets in Merlin’s eyes as he breaks free of Zach’s grip, and before Arthur can stop it, Merlin’s shoving his hands into Zach’s chest.

“What the fuck is your problem?” he snarls.

Zach laughs like a jackal—viciously—as he stalks towards Merlin. “My problem? What’s your problem, Emrys? Why’d you give me that look?” 

“Like you don’t know, asshole.”

Zach feigns mock hurt for a moment. “But I didn’t do anything to you,” he pouts. “Ohh, but you must be talking about your boyfriend. That’s right. Well, pushing him in the lake didn’t hurt him, I suppose, since he’s already a wet rag.”

Arthur watches Merlin’s face contort into several various degrees of anger and silently prays that this is the moment Merlin learns to just walk away from a fight. “Fuck,” he mutters when Merlin winds his fist back. It connects solidly with Zach’s mouth. 

Zach looks genuinely surprised as he stumbles under the force and brings his wrist to his cut lip, but Zach loves surprises, loves it when people cause shit for him so he can wreck the living hell out of them. He recovers quickly and just before Arthur can rein him in, slams his hand into Merlin’s eye, sprawling him out on a nearby table before leaping onto him with his fists.

The fight doesn’t last long, not with a developing crowd around them chanting, “Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!” Arthur gets pushed back by several spectators just as the student liaison officer rips Zach off of Merlin, and in seconds they’re both whisked away, leaving him trapped in a booing circle of students.

\----

Three days later, Coach du Lac pulls Arthur into his classroom after English. His desk sits at the back of the room, the walls covered with a calendar, a Whitman poem, and a series of pictures from all of his seasons of coaching. On his desk bounces a Shakespeare bobble-head that boasts ‘Quill Included!’

“Ah, Pendragon,” du Lac says cheerfully, though Arthur knows his perpetual enthusiasm can be deceptive after having sat through four years of pep-talks given through clenched, gritted smiles. du Lac folds his hands against his stomach and leans back in his chair, gesturing Arthur to sit. “How is your captaincy going?”

“Fine,” Arthur responds, and for the most part it’s not a lie. Morgan and he have come to a silent agreement that she takes care of the administrative details and plays bad cop to his heroic and charismatic good cop. Together they’ve somehow kept the team running, mainly powered by Morgan’s sheer insanity.

“And Merlin?” du Lac asks. “How are things with him? Of course I’ve heard about the mishap with Zachary.”

Arthur flushes a little and bows his head. For all his optimism, du Lac has never once demanded anything less of him than perfection, both on and off the road. He thinks of the way Merlin’s lip curled before he threw his punch and says, “Things aren’t going well, Coach.”

“I didn’t think so,” du Lac responds, but it’s without the disappointment Arthur expects. Instead, the coach looks resigned to the situation. “To be honest, I was a little hesitant when Ms. Smith suggested I put him on the team to boost his motivation,” he says. “And he is fast—surprisingly—but… I know you did your best with him, and I don’t think I could have asked anyone else to do a better job, but I’ve asked him to step down. It’d be better for the team morale.” 

He stands and walks to the front of his desk next to Arthur, laying a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry. I know you might be disappointed, but you’re still scholarship material. Universities are hunting for runners who are both talented and a leader, and don’t think you’re not just because of this. Lesser men wouldn’t have even tried had I asked.”

Arthur shifts uncomfortably under du Lac’s gaze and says, “Thanks, Coach,” hoping he looks both appropriately disappointed but also reassured. In reality, Arthur leaves the classroom overwhelmed with relief, free from the burden of having to socialize with their class’s biggest reject. And inwardly if he grimaces, he straightens his shoulders and prepares to take charge of the rest of the cross country season.

That is, until he catches sight of Merlin carrying his lunch from the cafeteria to the detention room for his in school suspension. With a single look, all of Arthur’s relief unravels and he blanches. His eyes dart around in search of an exit route and he winds up veering to the opposite of the hallway in a weak attempt at avoidance while determinedly staring at his shoes. He is so engrossed in pointedly not looking at Merlin’s black eye that he steers himself smack dab into the corner of Morgan’s open locker.

“Oh fuck!” he shouts in surprise.

Morgan appears from the other side of the locker door, and when she realizes it’s Arthur, she punches him in the arm. “I can’t believe you!” she shrieks.

“Fuck, Morgan, my eye! I just rammed my eye into the corner of your—”

“YOU ARTHUR PENDRAGON, ARE AN ABSOLUTE COWARD!” she continues. “You didn’t even have the decency to apologize for getting him kicked off the team!”

A few passersby slow down to stare at them, and a gaggle of sophomore girls snigger into their folders as they continue down the hall. “What? Morgan? I didn’t—how did you know already that he—my fucking eye hurts! And I wasn’t the one who told him to throw fists. The idiot did it all on his own!”

“Well you didn’t stand up for him either when Zach was making all those accusations.” 

“What is it you would have had me do, Morgan? Merlin is not my responsibility.”

And that pisses her off, her bangs whipping across her face as she takes two forceful steps forward, jabbing a hard finger into his sternum. “Look,  _Pendragon_ ,” she spits. “It’s your responsibility as a captain to make sure your team functions together. What sane person would follow a two-faced jerk off like you who only has the guts to be nice to someone when no else is watching. You’re spineless and wretched! But, at least you look cool, right?”

She slams her locker door shut and stalks off, leaving Arthur speechless in the hallway with a throbbing eye. The underclassmen forgo any discretion and openly gawk at him.

That night, Arthur slaps a bag of frozen peas on his face and lies down at 8:30. Practice had been a loveless affair spent avoiding Morgan’s death glares and Zach’s gloating about the black eye he’d whopped Merlin. Several rumors began about Arthur’s own black eye, saying that he too got in a fight with Merlin when really the only time he had seen him was his brief appearance from the cafeteria back to detention. The entire team run was ruined by the tension between him and Morgan who managed to avoid each other while still running side-by-side.

Arthur’s swollen eye keeps him awake. He gingerly pokes at it before wincing and reaches for the frozen peas on the nightstand, wondering if this is somehow Morgan’s idea of karmic justice. She wanted him to think about Merlin, and now he can’t sleep and has no choice but to do so as his head throbs in slow, expanding pulses. 

It’s the expression on Merlin’s face that Arthur replays over in his mind—that brief nanosecond where Merlin paused and looked right at him. In that breath, Arthur had the chance to step above his pride and defend Merlin. He didn’t even have to admit to their friendship to call the fight off. But even after the fact, Arthur still struggles to find the words he could have said that would have made Zach back down. That night at the lake, Merlin had taken all of Zach’s abuse passively, but he came to his friend’s defense immediately in the cafeteria when Will wasn’t even there to hear it. 

Merlin had mentioned Will once by name some time after he had shared with Arthur the brief details of his mother. “He tries to visit every summer. He’s where I’m from,” he said, as if he doesn’t live here, run these streets, sleep every night here in the same bed that sometimes Arthur catches himself imagining when he’s alone. Arthur can’t remember why Will ever came up in the conversation to begin with, the name Will a fleeting detail amongst the growing mass of information Arthur collects about Merlin.

If Merlin moved in with Gaius when he was ten, that means he’s lived in Tadita for nearly eight years, Arthur realizes. He tries to recall a memory of a smaller, younger Merlin but comes up empty. Eight years and Arthur never noticed him until they were forced together. He had a vague awareness of him but never looked him head on, only from the corner of his eye when they passed each other in the parking lot—Arthur going to practice, Merlin going down to the creek probably. Eight years and Arthur struggles to recalls something more than just a shadow.

“Do you know any of these people?” Will had asked that night on the riverbank, and Merlin had looked right at Arthur, right in his eyes.

“No,” he said.

No, Arthur echoes in his head. No, we are not friends. No. No. 

It pains him to admit that maybe Morgan wasn’t wrong. It’s his responsibility as captain to ensure his team is happy. To keep Merlin happy—if they were friends.

In the kitchen, he hears his father stack the clean dishes and put them away. The sound of the television flickers out and muffled footsteps pad down the hallway past his bedroom. When Uther shuts the door to his room, Arthur leaps out of bed and grabs his keys and his running shoes and heads for the garage.

In his father’s records, kept on outdated carbon copy, Arthur finds Gaius’ address: 1014 Lakeland Drive. It’s a good ten miles south of Tadita on the opposite end of Orenda Lake. Arthur stares forlornly at the Camaro, cursing its fickle transmission—which he then profusely apologizes for. It’s better this way, he tells himself. It’s symbolic or some crazy shit that he needs to run ten miles in the dark to get to Merlin’s just to say he’s sorry. Or something. 

Arthur didn’t come in third in the men’s state championship his junior year without being incredibly fast, and he always believes that endurance is essential to running shorter distances. Ten mile runs are not foreign to him, but ten mile runs in the dark after shitty five mile group runs are, and he can’t see jack shit. By the time he covers half the distance, his legs feel like heavy jello. He walks the last five miles and it takes him over an hour. By the time he reaches Lakeland Drive, he is exhausted and hungry, shivering from the cooling sweat on his skin.

Lakeland looks less like a road than it does a wide gravel path covered sparsely with trees. Gaius’ house sits at the end of a driveway that Arthur swears is another mile long. At the base of the steps sits a pile of wood with a chopping axe. The empty husks of several abandoned cars rust on the lawn, and a fly light flickers.  

Arthur rings the buzzer twice, shifts his weight back and forth on his feet, and peers through the dirty windows until a light flickers on upstairs. From his angle below, Arthur can’t tell who it is he woke up, but slowly the lights come on through the house as the person travels down the steps. The door makes a clunking sound when unlocked, and a familiar and slightly more disheveled head of hair appears.

“… Arthur?” Merlin says, voice still thick with sleep.  
\--  
“Um, hi. Merlin. Um—“

“Fuck, what happened to your face?” Merlin swings the door further open, and suddenly they stand in front of each other, Arthur in sneakers and his sleep shirt damp with sweat, and Merlin in loose pajama bottoms with matching black eyes. 

“I, uh, nothing,” Arthur stammers.

“Did you get into a fight?”

“Well, sort of?” he shrugs. And then amends foolishly, “No, I… not really. I just ran into Morgan’s locker, but it’s as if she wanted it to happen, so…”

Merlin drags his hand across his face and then through his hair as he leans his entire weight against the doorframe. “Right. So, why are you here?” he asks.

And Arthur isn’t sure what he expected, certainly not an ovation of joy from Merlin, but also not this cool collected person before him behaving as if nothing has happened between them, as Merlin’s mere existence before him dares Arthur to choose between apologizing or just sweeping it all under the rug. They could go back to normal so easily, he realizes. He could return to his clique of running friends and Merlin could sleep his days away in detention and never graduate, and they would never have to speak again.

But Arthur—who is sick and tired of being called a coward, and feeling like a coward and waking up from half-farcical half-maybe dreams of nosing along the slope of Merlin’s throat—doesn’t want to turn around and walk home because his legs hurt and he ran ten miles to get here.

“If you… If Zach apologizes for those things he said and Coach says it’s all right, will you come back on the team?” he asks, peering into the shadows of Gaius’ house. Merlin presses his lips together and makes a move to shut the door, but Arthur slaps his hand against it, his fingers perilously close to Merlin’s. He starts babbling, “I mean, you’re good, yeah? And—and it doesn’t matter whatever anyone says because all that matters is that you have legs and whatnot that carry you forward, right? So you should come back, um, to the team.”

Merlin huffs and shakes his head, but he looks a little amused and less likely to close the door. “That’s the worst pep talk I’ve ever heard. I thought you were supposed to be good at this.”

And Arthur briefly feels something swell in his chest, like—god forbid—he might cry. “I’m not good at this though, and I’m starting to get that, but you’ve got to help me out so I don’t fuck up anymore.” He inhales sharply, adding, “And—and— _I’m sorry_ , okay? Like fuck, I am here and I am sorry.”

It’s an inadequate apology, Arthur knows, and he’s ready to turn around and walk home when Merlin stares at him stupidly for a good fifteen seconds. Then he starts to laugh. 

“What? Why are you laughing?”

“Because—you!” Merlin says, covering one hand with his mouth. Arthur feels his face grow hot, and thinks that, okay, maybe he deserves it, but does he really have to rub it in? He turns to go, ready to admit defeat when Merlin’s hand clamps tightly around his wrist.

“Hey, wait. Arthur I didn’t mean… I’m sorry, come here,” he says, drawing him into his house. Arthur follows stupidly, confused and aware of Merlin’s cold fingers on his skin, and despite everything Merlin  _still laughs_. “I appreciate it, I do. But was it really that hard to say?”

“Yes,” Arthur whispers, stunned. “It really was.”  

And Merlin chuckles more, shakes his head and says, “Okay, okay. Come on. You’re all damp. How’d you get here?”

“I ran.”

“You ran. That’s… That’s ridiculous. You—you ran—of course you ran, you nut. You won’t be able to move tomorrow, you know.”

“I know.”

“We have to be quiet,” Merlin whispers even though he’s been the one talking the most. He holds fast to Arthur’s wrist and leads him up the stairs, turning the lights off behind them one by one until the hall is lit by a single dim glow from Merlin’s doorway. “Gaius is asleep. Only you would come out to the boonies in the middle of the night to say you’re sorry.”

And in a fit of utter honesty, Arthur folds his hand around Merlin’s wrist in return and says, “I couldn’t sleep.”

Merlin breathes for a moment—just breathes so that Arthur can see his chest rise and fall steadily. “Okay,” he says in all seriousness this time. “You’re cold and damp and you should probably stay the night, and—” He swallows and shuffles them into his room. “You’ll get chills if you keep your shirt on, and if I’m right about this—if it’s okay…” 

Arthur’s breath hitches when Merlin lets go of his wrist, ghosting his fingers over and under the fabric of Arthur’s shirt. He’s careful not to touch skin to skin until Arthur sighs, brings his hands to settle on Merlin’s elbows and says, “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you are absolutely right. I— _please_. You can—you can touch me.” 

Merlin lets out a quiet, shaky breath, and pulls the shirt over Arthur’s head. He chucks the garment carelessly behind him in what he probably thinks is a cool gesture. Arthur stifles his laughter but finds it endearing all the same, and then that’s it. Game over. Because he stops thinking when Merlin rests his hands against his torso, warm and heavy on his sides, leaning over him slightly. Arthur tilts his chin up and lets Merlin press their mouths together, and a fission of heat settles in his spine where Merlin’s fingers curl on his waist. Then he opens his mouth, leaning forward for more pressure and wet heat, drawing his hands up Merlin’s sides and over his shoulders, tangling his fingers in the short strands of hair at the nape of Merlin’s neck as they kiss.

Merlin pulls him towards the bed, a small twin sized affair that groans under their combined weight, and it’s so easy for Arthur to crawl over that lean body in the dark—if only to save space, he thinks—in the quiet where no one else can see them do this, see Merlin slide his knees apart as Arthur sinks against his body. Merlin skims his hands over the smooth skin drawn tight across Arthur’s shoulder and down his biceps, curling into the muscle. The heat of their stomachs pressed against each other is so hot that Arthur feels his organs expanding inside, filling every spare crevice in his body and outward until he has no other choice but to press down into Merlin until every inch of their bare skin is touching.

Merlin’s hips shift near-imperceptibly in search of more friction and Arthur can feel the outline of his erection through his running shorts. He freezes when Merlin skims his fingers down his back, dipping beneath the waistband, and suddenly Arthur grows uncomfortably embarrassed. He retreats, drawing up and away from the circle of heat to sit at the edge of the bed.

Merlin doesn’t press Arthur, but instead quietly wraps his long fingers around Arthur’s wrist. “It’s okay,” he soothes. “Come here.”

Self-consciously, Arthur lets himself be dragged back down to the mattress, lying by Merlin’s side with a hand’s length between them. Merlin smoothes his hand up and down Arthur’s arm and murmurs, “You’re probably tired, huh? All that running,” and Arthur’s swept with gratitude that Merlin isn’t pushing for more. “Let’s sleep.”

Arthur wants to touch him, but finds his entire body nearly immobile. He traces with one finger the outline of Merlin’s eyes, his nose, his mouth, bringing it up to sweep the ridges of his ear. Merlin shivers and settles into the covers as Arthur keeps this one point of contact, and they stare at each other for minutes until Merlin’s eyes slowly drift shut.

As Merlin sleeps, Arthur tentatively palms his whole hand over Merlin’s shoulder, still unused to being able to admit that he wants this, let alone that he has it. He brings his hand to rub Merlin’s scalp—sleep warm and soft under his touch—and is acutely aware of the hitch in Merlin’s breathing. Arthur strains to keep his eyes open, memorizing the moment in fear that Merlin’s affection will disappear upon waking to realize how gutless Arthur truly is. He settles against his side, closing the valley of their bodies in wonderment, counting the breaths and minutes, multiplying them to span hours and days in his imagination.

In the morning, Arthur wakes early, much like he does any other day, pressed against Merlin. He does not lie still for long and scoots off the mattress and in search of clothes. Merlin grumbles at his shuffling but smiles warmly up at him. In the light, Arthur studies Merlin’s room more carefully, the small dresser and closet door that doesn’t quite shut all the way, a picture of his mom holding him when he was just a toddler. He dresses, borrowing a fresh (and despairingly flannel) shirt, and Merlin bursts out laughing from the bed when Arthur tries to pull on a pair of Merlin’s jeans, sucking in his gut and hopping on one foot to pull them up.

The noise rouses a sleepy Gaius who opens the door in a nightcap and gown. Thankfully, Arthur has clothed himself but still blushes furiously while Merlin—still in bed—explains calmly that Arthur came over last night for a late night run and they didn’t want to wake him up. Gaius studies them for a long few moments before sighing exasperatedly. “Call your father,” he says to Arthur and shuffles out.

Gaius drives him home that afternoon, claiming he has work left to do in the shop. Merlin catches Arthur in a brief chaste kiss that has Arthur’s entire face flush hot, and Arthur extracts himself from Merlin, but not before failing at smothering the smile on his face. 

When they arrive at Arthur’s house, Gaius stays in the garage but doesn’t do any work so far as Arthur can tell. Instead he stands over the desk shoved in one corner of the garage talking in low conspiring tones with Uther. Arthur flees when they glance at him no less than five times and flops down on his bed, his heart thudding in its cage.

\----

On Monday he doesn’t see Merlin before lunch. It’s not unusual since they have no classes together, and Arthur isn’t even sure if Merlin’s given up skipping altogether. Still, his absence leaves something sour in Arthur’s gut, making him jump whenever he sees a brown head of hair, a lanky boy. He almost expects everyone he passes to see it on his face, this excitement and foolish nervousness, and at first he thinks they’ll clap him on the back, share in his happiness, but soon he imagines them instead pointing, whispering at him. His joy dwindles into something cold and heavy in his limbs. 

By lunch his excitement has devolved into dread. He sits between Morgan and Zach, stabbing at his pears. Across from him, Leah makes eyes at him that he ignores, slouching into his seat until she stalks off.

Zach nudges him and says, “What the fuck, dude. She’s totally into you.”

And Arthur thinks, this is it, the moment he can tell Zach everything from the beginning of the summer. You know how you pushed that Will kid into the lake, called them faggots? Well apparently I’m one too, he  rehearses in his mind before chucking his fork on to his tray. 

Between third and fourth period, Coach du Lac stops him in the hall and says, “Hey Pendragon, I’ve given it some thought and I want Merlin to stay on the team. I know that altercation was as much Zach’s fault, and it wouldn’t be fair to keep one on but not the other.”

“Great,” Arthur says, but doesn’t mean it, and turns to walk to class where he sits and counts threads in his jeans.

Merlin shows up to the team run after school and is greeted by people murmuring around him. Zach asks Morgan what he’s doing at practice, and when she doesn’t have an answer for him, Arthur shrugs and says, “I don’t know.” He spares Merlin a shy glance where he stands apart from the rest of the runners, but turns away to lead the front of the pack without saying hello.

He runs them around Orenda Lake on a road they usually don’t use for team runs, but it’s a place he and Merlin frequented over the summer. It’s narrow and quiet except for the inane chatter and they end up filing down in pairs to fit on the shoulder of the road. Merlin runs at the back of the pack even though he kept pace with Arthur all summer, and Arthur tries not to seek him out. He ends up turning to look over his shoulder so many times that Morgan punches him and says, “Why don’t you just run with him already?” and Arthur forces himself to swallow away the weight in his chest and stare straight ahead for the rest of practice.

Afterwards, Merlin grabs his belongings from the locker room and bolts right away as the others head for the showers. Arthur barely sees him leave and mutters a quick, “I forgot something outside,” to Zach before chasing after him. 

He catches him just outside the building doors and shouts his name. Merlin glances over his shoulder but continues walking, and Arthur has to loop his arm around him and physically turn him around to get him stop moving. Once he has his attention, Arthur says nothing, staring blankly at him, suddenly aware of their proximity to each other and the school where anyone could see them. He’s still a little light-headed from their weekend, Merlin’s closeness making him stupid with want and confusion. “Um, I’m glad you’re back on the team again,” he says lamely. 

Merlin frowns and half-heartedly says, “Thanks.”

Arthur lets out a frustrated noise before trying to shuffle closer, not really sure of what he wants—a touch, something—but Merlin stops him by pressing a hand to his chest and keeps him an arm’s length away. “Look, I get it,” he says. “About… us—this. The team. I’ll stay on and run and all, but you don’t have to—we don’t—you know.” 

“Merlin—”

He looks at Arthur determinedly and shakes his head. “No, look, if you’re going to be like this when there are other people around… I mean, we weren’t even ever friends. So I’ll just keep running and you can get the pat on the back for helping the dumb loser out, and everything else can be like it was before, okay? If it’s going to make you uncomfortable and you won’t be able to… to even look at me… I mean, is it because I’m a guy or because I’m the social retard?”

“I—It’s not like that,” Arthur starts but gives up and instead reaches out for Merlin’s wrist to pull him in. Merlin moves closer, with caution, but then settles into the loose embrace. Arthur can feel his own pulse race, acutely aware of how out in the open they are even as he struggles for something to say. He wants to draw him tighter to his body, press him to his chest, but his hands freeze on his shoulders, immobile. 

Behind them the building door swings up, and Zach wanders out, calling, “Arthur?”

Without thinking, Arthur retracts, dropping his arms, hyper aware and tense. Merlin hovers for a moment with a blank, confused expression before curling his hands into fists at his sides. A flicker of anger passes over his face before he closes off and backs away.

Zach jogs up to them. “You left all your stuff inside, man,” he says, and then eyes Merlin. “Is he bothering you?”

Arthur shakes his head and brushes him off. “I’ll be right in. I just had to…” He gestures lamely in Merlin’s direction. 

Merlin retreats another few steps without looking at them. “I’ll see you tomorrow at practice,” he says in a tone that Arthur can’t interpret, and walks away. There’s something final in the set of his shoulders as he leaves that prevents Arthur from calling out, rooted in silence until Zach drags him back inside.

\----

Arthur grows used to the heaviness in his chest when he sees Merlin at practice, learns to bury the guilt. It’s better this way, he tells himself, certain that anything with Merlin would be more trouble than it’s worth. He sometimes even forgets anything happened until he catches sight of him in the lunchroom or in the halls. On runs, Merlin continues to ride mid-pack, and the team grows accustomed to his presence without acknowledging him. For Merlin’s part, he doesn’t want to be acknowledged and tries not to engage with anyone beyond what’s necessary, ignoring Arthur whenever they’re in the same vicinity.

Arthur divides his time between running, school, and filling out college applications. He falls asleep twice on his open pre-calc book and spends so many minutes of his day not looking at Merlin that it wears him down. Ms. Smith calls him into her office, sits him down, and tells him she’s concerned for his well-being.

“You look like a zombie,” she says bluntly, a few short curls falling as she leans forward to study him. “I mean—not a zombie because obviously you aren’t dead. I meant mentally, um, unwell. Exhausted! I meant exhausted.” She puts a hand over her mouth and takes a deep breath, as if recalling all of her training to use on herself. “I mean, are you sure you’re doing okay?” 

Arthur mumbles some excuse about it always being like this during cross country. He doesn’t admit that his workload is heavier or the bit about screwing up his chance at a real relationship. She frowns at him, not quite believing.

“If you’re sure,” she says.

Arthur stands up to go, but she stops him with a hand on his arm. “One more thing.” She presses an envelope into his hand. “I wrote up a letter of recommendation for you. I’ve been meaning to say thank you for helping Merlin out. Mr. du Lac says he’s doing well on the team, and he hasn’t been in detention for three weeks. I think it’s a record. Of course, his attendance is patchy at best, but we can’t have everything.”

Arthur laughs weakly, overcome with a sudden flash of pride and fondness for Merlin. He thanks her shakily and leaves, and when he finds the envelope shoved at the bottom of his backpack that night, he holds it in his hands without opening it before shoving it in his desk drawer.

\----

The team travels to Delamont High School for their first meet. Eight schools come to compete in the hot fall sun, and the starting field swarms with runners and spectators. The freshmen huddle together, and Morgan runs around shrilling crazily whenever she gets reunited with an old running friend from other schools. 

Merlin dons his track sweats to keep his muscles warm, pulling the hood over his head and peering out of it at the mass of people. It’s hard to know what he’s thinking, if he’s excited or not for his first race. Arthur watches him from the corner of his eye, only half-partaking in some running jargon with the guys.

Eventually he breaks away from his friends, compelled to Merlin like metal to a magnet. He stops beside him, careful to keep the space between them. “Are you nervous?” he asks casually.

Merlin looks at him with a neutral, unreadable expression, and Arthur can’t tell if his presence is welcome or not. Merlin shrugs, “I don’t think so. As long as I finish.”

Arthur shares an uncomfortable chuckle with him, and it almost feels normal, like they might be two acquaintances and nothing more. “You’ll be great,” Arthur says too cheerily, and then tentatively squeezes Merlin’s shoulder. 

Merlin smiles sardonically but doesn’t shy from the touch. “Thanks, I’m sure I won’t die or anything.” They share an uncomfortable moment together as the girls’ teams start lining up for the race, and then Merlin excuses himself to the water cooler.

It’s still early enough in the season that it’s muggy and hot outside. Arthur cherishes morning runs before the earth has time to soak up the sun’s heat, but the boys’ race starts during the hottest part of the day. He can feel the sweat at his back causing his shirt to cling to his skin. He shucks off his sweats and jogs up and down a small stretch to warm his muscles, keeping half of his attention on the competition around him and half on Merlin who has plopped himself down on the bleachers lazily. 

When the boys are called to the start line, Merlin casually pulls off his sweat pants and sweatshirt and saunters to the back of Tadita High’s runners. Arthur jumps up and down. As captain and the team’s fastest runner, he stands at the front of the line with Zach and a couple of other guys on either side of him. This year, du Lac began coaching the four fastest runners into running as a group with Arthur in the middle and the others surrounding him to help hold a position in the lead pack. They strategized wind drafting on their long runs when Coach took them out onto flat country roads, dirt and grit and the smell of manure kicking up their nostrils. Arthur looks behind him past twenty Tadita High jerseys until he spots at the very end, Merlin, who’s only real coaching was, “Keep up the good work. Make sure you’re hydrated,” from du Lac, and the brief, informal summer Arthur shared with him. When the gun fires, Arthur isn’t even ready and stumbles through his first two steps. 

The team adapts to a new vigorous schedule of races, traveling weekends on little sleep and too much pizza to come home to a pile of homework before crashing. Zach takes to drinking Monster energy drinks in the morning. Morgan sleeps in the dim corners of the library during lunch. By the time they recover from one race, it’s time to travel to another.

Arthur finishes in the top ten of every meet and du Lac starts introducing him to scouts who shake his hand and tell him they can’t wait to see him run at state. Arthur promises them a show.

To everyone else’s surprise, du Lac also starts pulling Merlin aside for these informal meetings too. “This is Merlin Emrys. It’s his first year running, and we’re very fortunate at Tadita High to have him,” he says before a race a few weeks before state. “For the last four races, he’s finished in the top 20 so you can imagine what he’ll be like with more experience under his belt.” 

The scouts eye him, shake his hand, and Arthur watches him flush under the attention. He stands a little taller and walks away with a happy smile on his face that carries Arthur for the rest of the day. For the boys’ course, he kills the race, nabbing his first first-place finish of the season. Not far behind him, Merlin comes in seventh. 

It’s a great day all around and everyone is in high spirits. The boys’ team takes second and the girls’ take first. Afterward, they go out for Italian, assailing the entire restaurant staff by being boisterous, starving teenagers, led by Zach in the quest for breadsticks. Arthur even manages to trap Merlin in a booth alongside the usual crowd—Zach silently tolerating him and Morgan waggling her eyebrows at Arthur unsubtly.

Merlin—high from his fast race—enjoys the conversation more, smiling and laughing. He doesn’t shy away when Arthur finds reasons to reach around him for the ketchup, steal the tomatoes off his side salad even though Arthur hates tomatoes. It’s casual and not uncomfortable and leaves Arthur more flushed and happy than any first place finish could, using the close quarters of the booth as an excuse to lean a little into Merlin’s warmth without drawing too much attention.  For the first time in a long time, the weight in Arthur’s chest eases. Tonight he is just a boy at the center of the universe, driven by his teenaged urgency to touch and draw affection from those around him. He swings his arm around Merlin’s shoulder and jostles him closer, laughing loudly in his ear, and holds him there, fitted against his side for a second too long before letting him go. 

Later on the bus ride home, Zach pokes Arthur awake in the back seat and jerks his head towards the front where Merlin sits, his head pillowed into his jacket. “What’s the deal with you and him?” he asks.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, man,” Arthur responds, his fingers digging into the material of his wind pants. 

“Yeah. You do. You asked him to sit with us. It’s like you couldn’t keep your hands off of him.”

“Whatever, dude.” Arthur fumbles for something to hold onto and clutches tightly to his iPod. He makes a show of putting in his earbuds. 

“No, not whatever,” Zach says, elbowing him. “I was sitting  _right there_. Do you like him or something?”

Arthur splutters, growing hot. “What? No—I—no!” 

Zach leans forward, gets right up in Arthur’s face, and says lowly, “Do you  _like… him?_ ”

Is he that obvious? Arthur asks himself. Do other people see him looking? Arthur tries to play it cool, shrugging nonchalantly. “Look, man. I’m captain of the team, right? Merlin’s part of that team and nobody talks to him. He’s fast… and he’s nice? Not really rude or anything—well sometimes, but—we shouldn’t write him off.”

Zach rolls his eyes and says, “Whatever dude,” folding his arms over his chest. He dismisses the conversation by relaxing into the seat, and in a few minutes he’s fast asleep. Arthur sits in the quiet, embarrassed and angry at himself. Even then, he can’t help but glance to the front where he can make out the dark shape of Merlin’s head cradled against the window.

Morgan pops up from the seat in front of them, checks briefly to make sure Zach is actually asleep, and turns to Arthur. She reaches over the back of the seat and yanks out his earbuds. “I don’t care, you know. It’s actually sort of nice to see you act like a human. I didn’t realize you could be decent to someone.”

Arthur shifts and stares at the ceiling, pointedly ignoring her. “Go away, Morgan. Don’t you have anything better to do besides eavesdropping?”

“Nope. You were so happy this summer,” she says fondly, a little wistfully. She turns to look at Merlin and tells Arthur, “You should do what makes you happy.”

He looks nervously around him at the people either sleeping or plugged into their iPods. “It’s not that easy. Just leave off.”

Morgan frowns at him and puts her headphones back into her ears. “It must be so hard for you,” she says, “caring about your petty high school reputation so much.” She turns around and slumps back in her seat. He scowls and kicks the back of her seat twice before drawing his knees up to his chest for the rest of the ride home. 

\----

This is how the season ends:

Coach du Lac drives his top runners down to Camp Wilson where the state championships are held annually. He ends up taking three girls and three boys. The rest of the team rides down on a bus as spectators along with some friends and family. No one is surprised when Arthur and Morgan make it to finals, but even du Lac expresses some amount of shock at seeing Merlin on the roster along with two sophomores. 

Gaius and Uther drop off Arthur and Merlin at the high school before carpooling themselves down to Camp Wilson. Arthur, a seasoned pro, takes only a light duffel bag with him, but Gaius tries to dump two suitcases onto Merlin who scowls and looks around desperately as they make a scene. He ruffles Merlin’s hair and tries to tell him how proud he is, and Merlin turns beet red, slowly backing away from the car with a pained smile on his face. When they leave, Arthur laughs and teases Merlin, pretends to coddle him a little as an excuse to brush against him and later helps him sort through all of his belongings until it fits into one bag.

They pile into the back seat, bringing Morgan with them while the underclassmen sit in front, and for four hours they endure Morgan’s cat-like wailing to her iPod. They engage themselves in a game of Would You Rather (“…eat horse dung or vomit?” “…wrestle an alligator or a venomous snake?” “…make out with a buffoon or Morgan’s grandma—ow!”) and then are lulled to sleep by the low hum of the tires on the freeway. Arthur wakes to a mouthful of hair and a stutter in his heart. Morgan smirks knowingly at him from her seat by the window. 

Arthur revels in the fragile camaraderie he has developed with Merlin in the last two weeks. It’s paper-thin but still solid, something he can run his fingers over if he dares to. He’s careful not to call it a friendship. They are only two people who sometimes appear in the same place at the same time. It’s not everything Arthur wants it to be, but it’s something he feels less inclined to hide away from everyone else.

It’s a cloudy, windy day at the end of October. They squint into the wind and dirt that flies into their face, shielding themselves with their hoodies drawn over their eyes. Arthur feels the tight knot of apprehension tangle in his stomach when he looks at the competition. They all seem to be taller and leaner than he is, faster than the year before. 

At the boys’ starting line, a crowd of red and gold appears bearing Tadita High sweatshirts. Morgan waves cheerfully at them, but she stays clumped with the other runners and away from the spectators. Even her usually peppy mood is dampened by nerves. 

Uther tries hailing Arthur three times from the sidelines, but he pretends not to see it. Instead, he wanders closer to Merlin who has drawn into himself, staring out at the starting field. “Come on,” Arthur says to him. “Let’s go warm up.” 

Merlin tags along with with reluctance, half-heartedly jogging in a loop around the starting field. Arthur leads them down part of the race course that bends through the woods which cut the wind, and they stop to stretch out their muscles. They can hear the chatter from the field, but can’t see anyone. It’s pleasant, almost as if they were on a summer run together.

“Fifteen minutes to start,” the announcer says, his voice booming in the open space. Merlin suggests they head back to the starting line. Arthur walks close to Merlin, presses their arms together so he can feel his body heat all the way back. He ignores the calls as their teammates cheer when they reappear and instead focuses on the warmth of the boy next to him. 

Merlin is equally silent. Arthur wants to wish him good luck, but ends up simply resting his hand between his shoulder blades. They strip off their sweats, shivering in the sharp wind, and the officials separate them based on PR times.

“Five minutes to start,” the announcer says. Arthur loses sight of Merlin, hears the wind whipping in his ears. Other boys surround him, jogging in place, rubbing their arms up and down. He toes the white chalk line, peers out at his father’s stony face. A sort of tranquility settles over him as he waits, at the beginning of the end—his last year, his last season, his last race as a boy. 

“Thirty seconds to start,” the announcer says. The field grows eerily quiet, and Arthur can taste metal in his mouth, feels all the runners lean forward like hounds, eager for the bait. He imagines his mother like this, what it must have felt like, if she would have been cowed by the wind. 

“Ten seconds to start.” He wonders if his father had smiled then, what it sounded like to hear him cheer instead of his intense silence at every meet.

The starter lifts the gun. “On your mark.” Arthur thinks of Merlin, leaning forward, how he looked that first day so sullen and pale in the summer heat.

“Ready—” 

The runners inhale a collective breath and the pistol fires. They kick forward, each boy on their own jockeying for position. Arthur files behind five boys, drafting behind them to save energy. They take the first corner that runs along the side of the woods that he and Merlin had wandered through, and then turn into a corn field. The stalks are as high as their heads, withering in the autumn chill. They whisper huskily in the wind as Arthur chases passed them. 

The course loops around the field and back through a path in the woods that narrows and forces them to run single file. The runners break into two packs, and Arthur is clumped with about fifteen boys that he cannot see. He focuses putting one foot in front of the other, feeling the weightlessness of sprinting. The wind batters against his face, and he dares to press closer to the boys in front of him without tripping over their feet. The path is treacherous. Though the volunteers and staff went through and cleared the course beforehand, the wind knocks down new branches and twigs. The stormy sky makes it difficult to see where the dips and crevices are and Arthur nearly trips twice, cursing under his breath as he stumbles to regain balance.

Some of the spectators have moved to cheer them on at the exit of the woods. He passes Morgan and Zach in a blur waving little red and gold banners. Gaius tries to run with them for a few yards with his camera, all the while yelling, “Go Arthur! Go Merlin!” before exhausting himself. Arthur thinks Merlin must be close behind but loses that train of the thought the minute they hit the stream.

There’s no time to hesitate. The boys push through the water that comes up to their knees. It slows them down, the sand shifting unsteadily under the force of their feet, and when they emerge, their socks and shoes are laden with water. Several people trip behind, toppling into the faster current, and the pack separates again until the leaders dwindle down to six runners, their shoes squelching uncomfortably in a chorus of uncomfortable steps.

“Fuck me,” one boy says, and they half-laugh half-pant, whooping as they break away from the others. 

For all the training, the two months of school and the summer before that, plus the dreaming and cutting out newspaper articles, and the collection of photos of Igraine on the wall, it’s the shortest sixteen minutes of Arthur’s life. Five minutes from the finish line, a drafter trips over the front runner’s feet while trying to pass on a narrow path. Arthur is five people deep and manages to react in time to avoid the pile up, but just barely. The whole front pack clogs enough to let the second group behind them catch up, and the two fallen runners lose their place in the lead even though they scramble to their feet.

Arthur’s adrenaline soars as he sprints forward, turning around the edge of the forest and back into the field where they started. He can see the orange cones and the finish line carrel decked with colorful flags. His legs kick underneath, his stride lengthening and quickening as du Lac runs frantically alongside the path yelling, “Go! Go! Faster!” his perfectly coifed hair in absolute disarray.

In his periphery, the shadow of another runner closes in on Arthur. His arms pump faster, his whole body careening forward against the wind, separating himself from the other boy. The flags are within reaching distance, and he physically puts out his arm and wraps his fist around the finish-line tape, ripping through it with the momentum of his body.

And then the sound hits him, the cheering and the bullhorns and cowbells. He feels a little lightheaded from the panting as his feet slow down, and he wants to scream but finds no voice, just throws his arms up over his head in relief and victory. Morgan jumps over the carrel fence yelling, “Oh my god! Oh my god!” and sprints—

—right past Arthur to throw her arms around… Merlin? 

Arthur whips his head around, still gasping for air to look behind him. Merlin stands, smiling a little dopily, his head thrown back as he laughs, wrapping his arms around Morgan’s waist. Sweat drips from his hairline and down his throat, the neckline of his t-shirt drenched. He reaches a hand out and Arthur comes to him in a daze, tripping over his tired feet. 

“…Wha?” Arthur pants, letting Merlin’s arm fall around his neck.

“I was right behind you! I could almost touch you I was so close!” Merlin yells over the noise, grinning with wild happiness. He shakes Arthur’s shoulder, and Morgan leads them in jumping up and down in a circle. Arthur hops up and down loosely, still uncomprehending until Coach du Lac runs over with an ecstatic grin on his face.

“I can’t believe it! You—you won!” he says to Arthur, hugging him. The entire Tadita High team hurtles over the carrel as the officials try to hold them back. They swamp around them in a mosh pit of hugging and tumbling. 

And amidst the frantic celebrating, du Lac turns to Merlin and wraps him in a suffocating bear hug. “And  _you_ ,” he says above the crowd. “You surprised us all.” 

\----

Coach du Lac allows the runners to ride home on the bus instead of the van. Arthur and Merlin get pulled in every direction and hardly have a moment together, but Arthur is so happy he can’t even be bothered by it. Anything he says or does or sees is followed by him thinking, ‘I won!’ in the bright neon letters of his mind. But it’s the thought of Merlin coming in second, making the all-state team that fills him from the inside out.

To the great reluctance of all the parents, Leah hosts a celebratory party at her lake house, though she doesn’t tell any of the parents that her family is out of town. Arthur suggests driving Merlin out there, suffers a lecture about drunk driving from Uther as Gaius looks on and an embarrassing moment when Gaius pulls Merlin in a hug and almost cries. Merlin scrambles into the Camaro in a panic and doesn’t think to ask if the transmission will break down again until they’re halfway to their destination.

(Arthur has his own moment with his father earlier in the privacy of his room while he dumps his belongings on the floor. Uther stands in the doorway watching his son, his hands loose and awkward at his sides. They make small talk about the course, commenting on Arthur’s muddy socks, and then Uther makes an aborted gesture of a hug that turns into a handshake. “She would have been so proud of you,” he says, and then amends with great effort, “I am proud of you.”) 

Leah plies them with alcohol as soon as they show up. Zach immediately tackles Arthur and says to Merlin, “Sorry there’s no pot, bro,” in a not unkind way before pulling Arthur away and towards the girls. Merlin stands awkwardly with a beer by the wall. 

The party is much like the bus ride home, everyone clambering for Arthur’s attention. The only difference is the music that thrums so loudly Arthur can feel it in floorboards. They keep passing him drinks: shit beer and fruity cocktails that he sips out of and sets down again before someone’s handing him another. Leah begs him to dance, which he agrees to reluctantly, and he spends the majority of the night on her living room floor between girls, buzzing on whatever is in his hand at the moment.

Somewhere along the way, Morgan sidles up to him, lets him put his hands on her waist—if only for a moment. They dance close but not too close, separated by their childhood spent together and a history of animosity. She hands him a glass of water and gives him a knowing look. “Isn’t there someone you should be talking to right now?”

Arthur whips his head around, trying to see above the heads in the crowd. “Where is he?” he shouts.

She looks behind her towards the porch before mouthing, “Outside.” 

Arthur lifts his plastic cup to her before snaking through the dancers. He grabs his coat off the rack on the way out. On the porch, a couple makes out in the dark away from the living room. Arthur ignores them and makes his way to the door where he can see Merlin sitting on the steps leading towards the dock.

It’s peaceful outside, only the faintest thrum, thrum of the beat bleeding through the walls. Later, Arthur will remember this moment being the salient point of his senior year, not making the all-state cross country team or the first place finish. The biting air sobers him up as he opens his coat, and when he reaches Merlin he drapes it casually over his shoulders.  

Merlin looks up at him and scoots over so Arthur can sit. “Hey,” he says, taking in Arthur’s flushed face. “You’re kind of drunk. Does this mean I get to drive the Camaro back?”

Arthur snorts. “I’m not that drunk. I’m sobering up at least. Why don’t you come inside and dance?”

“Does it look like I can dance?” Merlin jokes, exhaustion wearing thin around the corners of his mouth.

Arthur shrugs a little and shifts so he can see Merlin’s face properly. “We could go in and dance? Together, I mean.” The brisk air emboldens him, and he reaches out and lays his hand over Merlin’s between their bodies.

Merlin lets out a short, sharp exhale of air. He lets Arthur’s hand stay but doesn’t turn his palm up to meet Arthur’s fingers. Instead, he stares out at the lake blankly for a moment, his breath coming out in cool puffs. “What is it that you think we’re doing, Arthur?” he asks finally.

Arthur frowns and tightens his fingers over Merlin’s. “I—I don’t really know.”

“I know you don’t,” Merlin says with resignation. “You’re sweet. You have a good heart—I can see it. You just let other people get in the way of it.”

“I’ve been trying.”

“I know. I know, Arthur, and I’m grateful for that. But where do you think this will end up? You’re smart. You get good enough grades and are a champion. You’re popular. I’m still on the verge of flunking out and this running thing doesn’t change any of that, just proves that I’m fast.”

Merlin leans forward, presses a chaste kiss to the corner of Arthur’s mouth and holds himself there, breathing against his skin. Arthur tangles his fingers a little desperately in Merlin’s shirt, his mind reeling. “You’re going to be great, Arthur,” Merlin whispers. “And I want to thank you for giving me the best summer. So thank you.”

“Merlin,” Arthur breathes, bringing his hands to smooth over his jaw. He kisses him properly, and Merlin allows him for a moment before pulling away.

“Thank you, Arthur. But it’s time to end this.” 

Merlin pulls away and stands, sliding the coat off of his shoulders before tucking it around Arthur. He looks at him fondly once more before traipsing away and back into the house.

\----

In the end, Morgan finds him shivering on the steps, still a little drunk. She pulls his keys out of his pocket, and he lets her drive him and the Camaro home. They lie on his bed, his head resting in her lap, while she runs her fingers over his hair until he falls asleep.

Arthur doesn’t see Merlin at school. They have no classes together, and now that cross country’s over, no one’s obligated to come to practice, though a skeleton crew of diehard members still meets up throughout the winter to take on the icy roads. Sometimes he hears others talk about him. They saw him in such-and-such class, he got detention for mouthing off to so-and-so, and Arthur swallows the jealousy he feels knowing that others have seen him, spoken to him. 

Sometimes if Gaius hasn’t left by the time Arthur gets home from school, he asks after Merlin (How is he? Does he still run? What are his plans after school? He’s well. He runs. Lord knows what that boy wants to do), but it leaves a bitter taste in his mouth afterwards, so he just stops asking questions, tries to bury the ache for good.

It helps that in April, he finds out that he’s been awarded a partial scholarship to Washington State with work study in addition. Morgan gets accepted into Pacific University, a private school in Oregon where her father lives, and they make plans for a road trip over the summer to tour the entire West Coast. Then he has the ACTs and AP exams, and when someone remarks on how surprised they were to hear that Merlin Emrys kid is actually graduating, Arthur only pauses for a moment before passing on.

Through it all, Arthur runs.

In the summer, he wakes up one morning and pulls on his shorts, contemplates putting on a shirt, and fishes his running shoes from the closet. He pours himself a glass of milk, eats a slice of toast, and heads onto the trail.

It’s a bright but cool morning around Orenda Lake. He jogs the Wakanda Trail around the south bank, a good ten miles outside of town and listens to the loon calls, the steady rhythm of his footfalls and breathing. It’s a beautiful day, he thinks plainly. He’s grown to love this path, the peacefulness and the solitude. It’s good for the days when he just wants to be himself, when he doesn’t want to worry about packing all of his belongings and moving halfway across the country. As he runs along the dirt path, he muses over what shitty music Morgan might want to sing along to on their road trip, devising ways to secretly sabotage her iPod. 

Something ahead of him catches his sight and derails his thoughts. He pauses when he sees a flash of white in the woods further up the trail, and it’s accompanied with a familiar ache, now receding, and a certain fondness too. Arthur’s certain the figure hasn’t caught sight of him yet, and so he spares a few seconds of quiet to watch the speck of brown hair bob up and down, pale legs stretching in front of that lanky body with ease. 

Arthur lets this feeling go, the tightness in his chest. He remembers what his silence cost him, but also everything he’s gained, and so he carries it with him and resumes his run with the promise to be faster, to be stronger and better with every step.

\----

End.


End file.
